So the focus of the partnership is on marrying Salesforce’s “system of record” status around customer relationship data, with IBM’s lead in cognitive computing in the form of Watson. IBM brings large data sets to the table as well as additional machine learning capabilities that likely accelerate the application of cognitive or ML techniques to Salesforce’s datasets, hopefully to the benefit of their mutual customers.

Salesforce Einstein, an AI platform that debuted last year that mines data to help salespeople close leads, will combine with IBM Watson to provide data-based insights for businesses.

For example, an insurance company running Salesforce could use real-time weather updates from Watson to warn customers about impending bad weather. Or Watson’s retail industry data could combine with Einstein’s customer-habit information to create targeted campaigns for shoppers.

“AI is accelerating,” says Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff, adding that partnering with IBM was a natural given “how I respect how they have stayed true to customer values, and that admiration has turned into huge business opportunities.”

If IBM can ink more of these types of arrangements, they’ll get the mileage out of Watson and the data sets they have purchased and maintain. It’s really interesting to see unfold.

But even better, as an IBM partner, fun to be a part of building solutions that leverage these products that we use ourselves at BP3. There’s amazing potential to unlock, which is why we’re already applying these tools at BP3 to improve our own ability to manage customer relationships.